Humic acid is a kind of organic matter caused and accumulated by animal and plant remains, mainly plant remains, through microbial decomposition and transformation and a series of geochemical processes. Its total volume is staggering, trillions of tons. It can be found in rivers, lakes, seas, soil, coal mines and most of the earth’s surface. Because of its widespread existence, it also has a great impact on the earth, involving carbon cycle, mineral migration and accumulation, soil fertility, ecological balance and so on. The total amount of humic acid in soil is the largest, but the average content is less than 1%. The total amount in brackish water is not small, but the concentration is lower. The most promising humic acid resources for development and utilization are some low calorific value coal, such as peat, lignite and weathered coal. Among them, the content of humic acid is 10-80%. China’s coal reserves are very rich. According to the data, there are 5 billion tons of peat and 126.5 billion tons of lignite. There is no statistical data on weathered coal. In this sense, the production and application of humic acid can also be said to be an aspect of coal chemical industry.

In agriculture, humic acid fertilizer made by combining nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium and other elements (for example, ammonium humic acid fertilizer can be made by neutralizing humic acid with ammonia), which has the functions of increasing fertilizer efficiency, improving soil, stimulating crop growth and improving the quality of agricultural products; NITROHUMIC acid can be used as acid regulator for rice seedling raising;

Magnesium humate, zinc humate and urea iron humate have good effects on supplementing magnesium deficiency in soil, zinc deficiency in corn and iron deficiency in fruit trees, respectively; Humic acid mixed with herbicides such as herbicide and atrazine can improve efficacy and inhibit residual toxicity; Sodium humate is effective in the treatment of apple tree rot.